5 Steps for Building a Successful Online Community – Ep 69

This past month we have been exploring how to build a successful online community and scale it to grow and support your nonprofit cause or your online or offline business. This episode is a wrap up to these recent, can't miss, episodes:

Today, we are going to talk about the five steps you can take to build a successful online community, including how to define your ideal members, ask questions, create content they want, choose a platform and engage and grow your community.

Step 1: Define your ideal online community member

Use social listening to hear what your ideal community member or customer is saying about their problems. Even if you don’t have a community of your own yet, join similar communities who have your ideal customer in them and observe what people in that community are saying about their challenges and desires.

Think of products that you can offer all along the growth path of your ideal customer by solving a current problem, then solve the next level problem, and so on. Create a ladder of products for your customers to climb to your higher level products.

Ask yourself what your life’s purpose is and who it is you are here to serve. Don’t waste your time on things that fall outside of that purpose.

Step 2: Ask your online community lots of questions

Ask questions within a group. Go all-in to find out exactly what your audience is looking for and then test your solutions to that problem to gauge interest.

Talk to people one on one. Reach out via DM, email or phone. Don’t sell them anything, just ask them questions to learn how they describe their challenges and concerns as it pertains to the topic of your expertise. Take note of the language they use.

Utilize polls and surveys. Use Twitter and Facebook to ask the community questions that help you gain a better understanding of them and know their wants and needs.

Step 3: Create content that answers your online community’s questions

Create content that directly answers a single question. This is great for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and also lets you see which content strikes a note with your community before you build it out into something bigger.

Create content that teaches instead of teases.

Step 4: Choose a platform where you will engage your online community most often

Find out where your ideal online audience is hanging out the most: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Snapchat or somewhere else? (You can get some demographic statistics on this chart from Spredfast)

Focus on that platform and build out an online community around the topic of your business, organization or expertise.

Step 5: Engage and grow your online community

Create a plan for engagement. It doesn’t happen unless you plan for it.

Have a private group or page to interact and engage with your community.

Take Action

Who is your ideal community member and what platforms are you going to use to connect with them? Share a tip for how we all can engage and grow our online communities in our private Facebook group. You can join us by clicking on the button below and using the secret work “ACTION” to join us.

How to reach Kami:

If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.

How to reach Madalyn:

If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.

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